Echo Button Skill Certification Overview

Important: The Gadgets Skill API is in beta and is subject to change at any time without notice. We welcome your feedback.

This topic describes aspects to consider before you submit your Echo Button skill for certification. These aspects include requirements that your skill must satisfy to pass certification, common reasons that skills fail certification, and additional recommendations to improve the user experience of your skill.

Certification Requirements

Before you submit your skill for certification, make sure that it satisfies the following requirements:

Custom skill requirements – Echo Button skills are a type of custom skill, so they must meet the same certification requirements as other custom skills. For these requirements, see Certification Requirements for Custom Skills.

Echo Button skill requirements – Your skill must pass additional functional tests that are specific to Echo Button skills. For a list of tests, see Tests for Echo Button Skills.

Kid skill requirements (if applicable) – If your skill is for kids, review the requirements described in the FAQ for Kid Skills.

You may only make your skill available in all countries if you create a voice user interface for one or more of the following languages: English (US), English (UK), or German.

If you create a voice user interface for a language other than English (US), English (UK), or German (for example, English (India)), you may only make your skill available in the US, UK, Ireland, Germany, and Austria.

Skills might be subject to additional requirements. If your skill does not pass certification, you will be notified of the specific issues that you need to correct.

Common Reasons Skills Fail Certification

The following are some common reasons that skills fail certification. For a comprehensive list of certification requirements, see the links provided in the previous section.

Example phrases – When you set up your skill, you provide three example phrases. These phrases appear on the skill detail card in the Alexa app. You must model your example phrases exactly like the sample utterances in your interaction model. For more information, see Review and Test Example Phrases.

Session management – If your skill prompts the user for a reply, it must keep the session open and open the microphone of the Echo device. To achieve this, set the shouldEndSession flag to false.

Help intent – When users ask for help, your skill response should provide instructions about the core functionality of the skill. This response should end with a question that prompts the user to provide input. For more information, see Providing Help.

Trademarks, Intellectual Property, and Brands – Your skill must not (a) imply sponsorship or endorsement by Amazon or otherwise mischaracterize the relationship with Amazon; (b) use the image or likeness of an Amazon device as part of the skill icon; (c) infringe the intellectual property rights (including copyright, trademark and publicity rights) of a third party; or (d) purport to be affiliated with a company or brand but is not the official skill of that company or brand. For more information, see Trademarks, Intellectual Property, and Brands.